The Random Discussion Site

Get rid of annoying Internet ads

2006-06-04T00:13:00.000-04:00

1. Get Mozilla Firefox from http://www.mozilla.com .

2. Download and install the Adblock extension for Firefox from that site.

3. Copy the following into a text file:

*.2mdn.*
*.doubleclick.net*
*.fastclick.*
*.casalemedia.*
*.euroclick.*
*.interclick.*
*.tribalfusion.*
*.falkag.*
*.adknowledge.*
*.advertising.*
*.atdmt.*
*.yieldmanager.*
http://www.megaupload.com/gui/floater*
*.primaryads*
*.clickboothlnk.*
http://brt.trb.com/ads*
http://media.nya*
*.cpxinteractive.*
http://imageshack.us/tag*
http://www.imageshack.us/tag*
*.pennyweb.*
http://www.hityourhead.com/banners/s*
*.bluestreak.*
*.hurricanedigitalmedia.*
*.blogads.*
*.revenue.*
*.smileycentral.*
*smileycentral*
*bannerconnect*
*.akamai.*
*.contextweb*
*burstnet*
*pagead2*
*auctionshare*
*.eyewonder*
*cdn2.*
*cdn.*
*.overture.*
*adserver*
*zedo.*
*creativeby*
*/ad.*
*.mediaplex.*

Save the text file and run Firefox.

4. In Firefox: Under Tools, go to Adblock -> Preferences.

5. Select Adblock Options, then Import Filters... Select the text file you just saved.

Congratulations! Whenever you browse the Internet with Mozilla Firefox, you won't be invaded by any of the flashing and beeping that you had never asked for. And, because Adblock prevents any of the blocked ads from loading, you should notice some web pages--especially the ones that would otherwise be full of ads--appear significantly faster.

A letter to Jack Thompson

2005-07-25T00:02:00.000-04:00

Jack Thompson is an attorney who fights violence in video games by selling half-truths and arguing them aggressively. You can read about him here or visit his website at http://www.stopkill.com.

To see if he would live up to his name, I have just sent this email to him and am awaiting any responses:

Mr. Thompson:

I have recently come across your website, http://www.stopkill.com. After reading it and doing some additional research on your opinions, I have a few questions and beliefs that have not been satisfied.

I am a 15-year-old male; my experience in FPS games is mostly limited to a computer game known as Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy, which I played habitually a year ago but have since stopped. I have played GTA: Vice City on two occasions in my life, and I believe I am agreeing with you when I say that it was a brutal game that was too graphic to be fun. The place where our opinions differ is that I do not believe that such games are responsible for violent behaviors, or they at least are no more responsible than the other factors which I am about to state.

On your website, you frequently criticize the video gaming industry for making these violent games available to teens. What I fail to understand is why you don't blame parents instead, who have a direct control over the games that kids play until they reach their early teens, at the very least. Wouldn't discouraging parental neglect be much easier and more effective than suing these companies and attempting to change the ratings of various games to AO? The main reason that I have not played video and computer games more heavily is that my parents prevented me from being exposed to them and that is much more effective than any law that could be passed; a person under 17 could still easily get games rated M through other people if his parents weren't involved, regardless of any laws that made such action illegal.

As to the notion that video games are the main cause of youth violence, that's absurd. First of all, as research by the U.S. Bureau of Statistics indicates, youth violence is at an all-time low (source). Even if it were going up, it seems to me as though the readily available weapons that are a constitutional right are much more tempting to would-be teenage murderers than some game where virtual people are shot.

You claim that video games reduce one's inhibition to kill. Let me say that I have known quite a lot of people who played violent video games actively, and none of them would ever have confused reality with a game. Only someone with mental problems would do that; but then, it's not the game's creator's fault that instable people are drawn to it, and there aren't any more of those people now than there were in 1950. The games draw murderers in much the same way as baseball matches draw fans, but those murderers are already murderers before they've played the game just as baseball fans are fans before they view a particular match.

The game I mentioned above which I used to play, Jedi Academy, lets players have special powers, including the ability to jump more than 30 feet high, survive 100-foot drops, and push bullets away with one's hands. Furthering your idea that normal gamers can confuse games with reality, I should be thinking that I can go jump off a cliff without any harm. Not surprisingly, I've never thought that, so maybe you understand why I have a difficulty understanding this particular belief of yours.

Finally, since your website contains quite a lot of speculation, let me finish my letter with some similar reasoning of my own. Maybe some people use FPS games as a source of stress relief, as they find the notion of blowing up virtual items a way to let out anything that has built up inside them. If these games were denied them, a very small percentage of them would perhaps start blowing up real people instead, as they wouldn't have such a convenient way to get rid of their stress anymore. Thus, having games right now is actually preventing violence.

I am sure you have reasons for believing in your side of this issue, but I fail to see many of those arguments. I would appreciate it if you could take some time to explain why you think that my reasoning above is flawed.

Thank you,

----

Harry Potter tops bestseller lists

2005-07-16T18:06:00.000-04:00

Article link

It looks as though the entire world is shivering in excitement at the release of the 6th Harry Potter book in the series, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Topping all bestseller lists, Harry Potter has been anticipated by readers worldwide since December '04 at the very least, when Amazon.com began taking orders for it. The book started selling at 12:01 am on July 16 and has since been disappearing off the shelves quickly.

Opinion-
I've read all 5 Harry Potter books and, of course, thought that they were good reads. They're the type of book that you have a hard time putting down since they're filled with non-stop action and a mystery on every page that will want to make you keep reading.

Nevertheless, this kind of outburst is uncalled for. Although exciting, I don't think the books have too much substance- they contain a decent and creative plot, but I've read several books that were just as good as them but are unheard of as far as most people are concerned.

Harry Potter's fans need to realize that HP is just a book, written by a normal person. It's simply not worth thinking about so much and shouldn't be taken as seriously as some fans are taking it, such as the girl in the article who won't be able to sleep until she has read every single page.

I'm planning on reading this book sometime around the end of July when the excitement has quieted down a bit, and will probably post a review of it here.

Any opinions?

Here's a cool game - download it!

2005-07-15T04:42:00.000-04:00

I never would have thought that such an old game could be so much fun. The game in question is called Supaplex, and I believe it was first made sometime around 1993. Since then, it has undergone several fixes and updates, and it now even has its own site. I've known about the game for a long time, but around 2000 it became too old for my newer computer, and I forgot about it until recently when I discovered it was downloadable for free.

If you enjoy puzzle games, I'm sure you'll like Supaplex. It involves maneuvering a smiling orange head called Murphy while collecting a fixed amount of "infotrons" that are needed to finish a level. Various obstacles try to stop you from doing so, such as hungry scissors, falling stones, and exploding bombs. Some levels require you to think as you try to keep the stones from blocking your path, while other levels are more action-packed.

Well, enough writing. You can download the game here (for free):

supaplex.zip

Once you become more familiar with the game, you can download additional levels from the site along with a level editor that allows you to create your own levels. Once again, here is the site:

http://www.elmerproductions.com/sp
Visit it to find out what controls to use and to view general hints and tips.

Trust me, the game is worth getting- the original 111 levels are very challenging and will keep you occupied for a while!

Screenshots:

Google Earth - WOW

2005-07-13T07:47:00.000-04:00

A few days ago, I was browsing Google's page of programs and other random items (here) and found Google Earth. For those of you who haven't heard about it, it's a free program, about 10 mb in size to download, that pretty much contains satellite pictures of every place on the planet. Not only could I find larger buildings with it, such as my school or the local airport, but I was also able to spot my house, which, I have to admit, is not one of those monstrously large mansions. The Grand Canyon is viewable in beautiful 3D, as are larger cities, at least in the United States. Google Earth contains another interesting feature- it lets you measure distances along roads, so if you want to know exactly how many miles and hours your trip to Uncle Bob's will consume, you can find out with a few clicks.

Other than that, I wouldn't really use Google Earth for anything practical, so I would classify the program as something really neat and a great illustration of where technology really is, but not something I would use every day. One feature in it is to give directions from one place to another, which I found rather confusing, and I would still stick to MapQuest if I ever needed to know how to get somewhere. Nevertheless, I would still recommend getting G.E.- it's free, and a great tool to waste an hour with while trying to find familiar buildings and famous landscapes. And the zooming in and out of Earth is breathtaking.

Speaking of Google products, about a month or two ago, I downloaded the Google Web Accelerator, which is supposed to be available here, but actually isn't because there is no more room for additional users. I used it for about a week, and after a few days, it had piled up an impressive amount of time saved (something around 2.5 minutes). Strangely, I was beginning to realize that the more I used the Accelerator, the slower my Internet actually became. So, I turned it off, and magically, my browsing was back to its original speed (I have cable). After turning it on again, the Net was so painfully slow that some pages wouldn't even finish loading completely, regardless of the minutes "saved". I uninstalled the Accelerator and forgot about it until now, but I can't get it back because of the user capacity problem.

Well, my posting is off to a start. Comments are always welcome!

Start of a brave new world.

2005-07-12T07:17:00.000-04:00

Well, I've just created my first site ever.

Will it be a success? Or will it turn into a disaster?

Will it be random enough?

With your help, maybe. Time will tell!